RIGHT OF FREE SPEECH

Evening Star, Issue 23444, 8 December 1939, Page 2

RIGHT OF FREE SPEECH

tolerance in sritain In the first month of the war there was much comment in the neutral Press, particularly jn the United States concerning the seventy of British censorship. Apparently much has vet to be done to perfect a system ot war-time reporting which satisfies everyone, but recently-written articles indicate that the Ministry of Information is now functioning more smoothly. Meanwhile admiring attention is being paid by neutral observers to the scrupulousness with which the British Government is preserving the rights ot* free speech unci unhampered cnticism in the United Kingdom. Providing- public speakers and writers do not broadcast information of use to the enemy, or downright sedition, they are continuing to say and to pen exactly what they think of the Government’s foreign policy and the manner in which it is going about the nation’s business. . Some examples of this tolerance —this maintenance of a great British, tradition—are quoted by a writer in an American journal to hand m the most recant mail. •« Britain’s literati,” he says, nave been carrying on a violent, open discussion in the newspapers on the subject of peace and war. George Bernard Shaw, in the ‘ Manchester Guardian,’ has plugged for peace. The biologist, Julian Huxley, has disagreed with Shaw*, choosing 1 * The Times ’ as his forum. “ Sir Oswald Mosley, leader of the British Union of Fascists, is still at large. Ho has often publicly admired Hitler and his methods. His newspaper, « Action,’ is being no more censored than is ‘ The Times.’ A fortnight ago London bobbies only yawned when Sir Oswald held an outdoor peace meeting in the West End, and directed his followers to stick up posters reading: ‘ Mind Britain’s Own Business.’ “In the House of Commons the 1 peace party ’ does not number more than a score of the 615 members. No attempt is being made to silence their

tongues, and opinions which in other countries in wartime w ° nld . 'f n %. ® man in gaol are freely uttered, (Ine peace party referred to here may be Mr TJoyd George’s Council of Action for Peace.)